Impact of anthropogenic absorbing aerosols on clouds and precipitation: A review of recent progresses

The climate impact of anthropogenic absorbing aerosols has attracted wide attentions recently. The unique forcing distribution of these aerosols displays, as instantaneous and in solar band, a significant heating to the atmosphere and a cooling in a close but smaller magnitude at the Earthʹs surface, leading to a positive net forcing to the Earth-atmosphere system, i.e., the forcing at the top of the atmosphere, which brings a warming tendency to the climate system. On the other hand, the atmospheric heating and surface cooling introduced by these aerosols have been demonstrated to be able to interact with dynamical processes in various scales to alter atmospheric circulation, and hence clouds and precipitation. Recent studies have suggested that the changes in precipitation caused by persistent forcing of anthropogenic absorbing aerosols through certain dynamical interactions, often appearing distant from the aerosol-laden regions, are likely more significant than those caused through aerosol–cloud microphysical connection confined locally to the aerosol concentrated areas. An active research field is forming to understand the changes in cloud and precipitation caused by anthropogenic absorbing aerosol through various dynamical linkages. This review discusses several recent findings regarding the effect of anthropogenic absorbing aerosols on cloud and precipitation, with an emphasis on works relate to the coupling between aerosol forcing and dynamical processes.